When you make a change in lifestyle, you also make sure that you make some changes in your habits, thoughts and overall life choices so that you can get desired results. Insanity is described as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.

I have seen many naturals struggle in their journey because they just can’t figure the natural hair thing out. Some have even gone back to a relaxer because their hair just “won’t cooperate”. At the same time, lots of other women won’t even give the natural hair route a chance because they just don’t know how other naturalistas do it.

When asked how I manage my hair, I simply answer by saying that “Natural Hair is a Mentality Thing” . To truly enjoy your hair while seeing desired changes in the overall health of your hair, you will need to make some changes in the way you would normally take care of your hair.

Here are ten things you should stop doing if you truly want to enjoy your natural hair journey…

1. Coveting other people’s hair because no matter how hard you try, your hair won’t change texture to the hair texture you want it to be.

2. Thinking your hair texture is an affliction and can never be made to look nice. With an open mind and lots of practice and patience, your hair can be made to look really beautiful.

3. Worrying about what other people think about your hair or will think about your hair. “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, not in the eye of the onlooker”.

4. Using the same hair brush you use to used to comb your weave or relaxed hair. Your coily hair will need completely different set of tools such as a wide tooth comb or a denman brush.

5. Straightening your hair and start wearing coily hairstyles. While there’s nothing wrong with wearing straight hairstyles every once in a while, you want to make sure that you minimize hairstyles you use to wear when you were relaxed. This way, you can truly maximize your experience as a Naturalista. Examples of coily hairstyles you could wear are flat twists, two-strand twists, twist outs e.t.c.

6. Using heat. Heat damage might not be visible with your relaxed hair, but it is very obvious with natural hair. Instead of a flat iron, you can stretch your hair using African threading or plaiting the hair. You can also substitute your curling wand for flexi rods, curl formers, or rollers. And instead of the blow dryer, you can style your hair at night so that it will dry by the next morning

7. Wearing compromising hairstyles. These are hairstyles which looks good but are wrecking havoc on your hair.

9.Combing your hair when it’s DRY. Simply applying grease in your hair prior to combing is not enough. The only way that you’d be able to easily glide a comb through your natural hair would be to saturate it with conditioner so that its soft to comb and painless.

Practice and Patience are virtues I do not possess when it comes to my hair. I must agree with you though – I comb my hair with so much ease that it amazes me more often than not. Thanks to all the Easy comb texturisers out there it is such a breeze. When I think of the torment we used to go through combing our hair when we were younger, I shake my head at unecessary pain which was inflicted on us.

I’ve been Team Natural for about 18 months now but mostly practice ‘protective styling’……. My hairdresser has to sleep in my house overnight if I am to leave home with a ‘coily hairstyle’. Yes, I am that lazy or unwilling to practice but who knows? Maybe I’ll repent from being ‘coily hair lazy’ in 2016….. 🙂